Due largely to erosion, the waterways of many areas of the world are becoming choked with silt and the like. As the waterways become more and more shallow, certain problems arise. For example, navigation through the waterways becomes difficult or altogether impossible. In addition, the risk of flooding adjoining areas of a waterway increases as the depth of the waterway decreases.
Over the years, many dredging techniques have been devised. Perhaps the most popular dredging technique involves a vacuuming dredge which sucks silt and the like from the bottom of the waterway through a conduit or a hose. This technique is disadvantageous in several respects. For example, it collects large volumes of water in the dredging process. As a result, the material recovered by this dredging technique is largely a liquid mixture that is difficult to handle and dispose of. By way of another example, the vacuuming technique mentioned above tends to disturb the bed of the waterway in a manner that mixes silt and impurities imbedded in the silk into the water. Some of these impurities may be toxic (e.g., lead and mercury). Dredging with this old technique can, therefore, pose an environmental hazard. Due to these and other difficulties, dredging a waterway using the vacuuming technique is an expensive, time-consuming and hazardous proposition
Recently, Caterpillar® has invented a new dredging assembly. The dredging assembly is a large wheel that rolls along and slices into the bed of a waterway. The wheel is compartmentalized by slicing blades that slice and pick-up segments of the bed of the waterway as the wheel turns in a fashion similar to a cookie cutter slicing cookies from dough. The development of this new dredging technology has made it possible to dredge waterways in a much more efficient, cost-effective manner. Specifically, because the dredging wheel lifts large segments of silt from the waterway bed, the material it recovers is largely solid and undisturbed, is not mixed with much (if any) additional water during dredging, and, thus, can be more efficiently handled than material recovered by the prior art vacuuming system discussed above.
While the development of the Caterpillar® dredging wheel offers a significant opportunity to recover material from the waterways of the world and to restore those waterways to navigable depths, it has also given rise to a new set of technological problems from the material handling perspective. Specifically, now that it is possible to quickly dredge large volumes of substantially solid material from a waterway, it is necessary to develop apparatus and systems for handling, transporting and/or disposing of the material recovered by the dredge.